


off to pay his crimes (and he's got no time for mine)

by kitseybarbours



Series: coming down [1]
Category: Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens (2015)
Genre: Canon Dialogue, Character Study, M/M, POV Second Person
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-31
Updated: 2016-01-31
Packaged: 2018-05-17 09:07:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,356
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5863138
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kitseybarbours/pseuds/kitseybarbours
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>You think of Hux, smiling as a planet burned. The noise in your head begins to subside.</p>
            </blockquote>





	off to pay his crimes (and he's got no time for mine)

*

“You can go.”

Hux’s voice is toneless, careless. He rolls over to face away from you.

You don’t move. The room is cold and his bed is warm. You stay where you are, your eyes heavy and your skin damp with sweat. Your torture of the rebel pilot earlier today took a toll on you, sapped all of your strength; and Hux has been unsympathetic. _The map, the droid…_ It’s too much to think about, too much to do. You’re exhausted.

“You can _go.”_

His voice is muffled by the starchy standard-issue grey sheets (he could have better, he’s a general, but he refuses to take anything more than what his troops have —  _well, for the most part)_  — but the words are harsh and clipped nonetheless. He’s using his _general_ tone now, as if you were any solider under his command. He has no patience for —  _this,_ for you, for any of it. You know this, and right now you don’t care.

“Don’t order me around,” you say, your voice low.

Hux sits up, his torso bare and pale, and looks at you with cold annoyance. His neat red hair is mussed.

“Get out, Kylo. Go.”

You keep your gaze fixed on him as you sit up, slowly, and climb out of his bed. You dress lazily at first, picking up your scattered clothes and tugging them on with languor — his green eyes flicker with impatience. But soon the Spartan coldness of his quarters becomes uncomfortable and you’re dressing in a hurry, petulant and peeved. He sneers.

“Goodnight, Hux,” you say sullenly, your earlier weariness _(release, relief)_ replaced with irritation. He gives no reply, and you turn your back on him.

You slip out, pace through the darkened corridors of the _Finalizer_ as silently as a shadow. You leave his cold room for your own cold bed and you try not to look back.

(You do. You always do. As if he’d ever follow; as if he’d ever call your name and beg you to stay the night.

You are young, but even you are not so naïve).

*

You are meditating when you receive an emergency alert in the middle of the night: a prisoner has escaped. You put on your mask and go swiftly to the bridge, and there on the front lines (so to speak) is Hux, barking orders and fuming and, every once in a while when no one is looking, pressing fingers to his temples and squeezing his eyes furiously shut.

“General Hux.” You approached him soundlessly, and now see his shoulders clench in surprise. “Is it the Resistance pilot?” He turns to face you, his features carefully arranged so as not to betray his shock or his anger or — anything else. It is a thin mask, and a poor one; his eyes still burn when he speaks to you.

“Yes,” he says tightly. “And he had help. One of our own,” he expels, his mouth set in a hard bitter line. “We’re checking the registers to see which stormtrooper it was.” He jerks his head to Captain Phasma, paging efficiently through the holofiles of stormtrooper records.

 _A stormtrooper._ All at once you remember Jakku: you recall streaks of blood across a skull-like helmet; a trooper freezing when you turned your gaze on him, knowing as well as he did that the non-firing of his blaster was by choice and not error. _FN-2187,_ something whispers in your mind.

“You don’t need to,” you say with absolute confidence. “It’s FN-2187. The one from the village.”

Hux stares at you. You see his jaw muscles working as he tries to decipher what you mean by this, how you know it. You know he is torn: he resents your powers and the advantages they give you, but in times like these even he must concede their usefulness…You wait.

In the end he doesn’t ask questions, only grits out “Thank you” as if it pains him.

You nod, and you go.

*

You see him angry the next day, see him stalking between the lines of his troops shouting orders and discipline. The traitor’s betrayal has shaken him: he hadn’t seen it coming, and now he can hardly believe that it happened at all. He takes his anger out on his soldiers, but they’re used to it.

He takes it out on you, too, later. His face is flushed, his eyes flashing like sea-glass. He is rough with you, his fingertips marking your skin, and this time _he’s_ the one who leaves after.

“You’ll be gone when I come back,” he bites out, and you don’t know if he’s telling you or himself. He dresses in silent haste and leaves, and you are left alone, bruises smarting and body sore.

You almost want to stay, to see his rage flare up again when he finds you still there. You go, and deny yourself the pleasure.

*

 “Supreme Leader Snoke was explicit,” Hux snaps as you leave the assembly room, where the two of you — but Hux in particular — have just been reprimanded by Snoke for allowing the prisoner to escape. “Capture the droid if we can, but destroy it if we must.”

His temper is short today, more so than usual; he is not used to being told off, and his blatant offence and irritation amuse you. He hates Snoke, you know; he mistrusts your shared religion and resents having to answer to Snoke, whose authority he views as being purely spiritual and thus as having no bearing on him.

(Hux has never respected you either, for that matter. You resent him for it; but then, the feeling is mutual).

“How capable are your soldiers, General?” you ask him insolently, the mask distorting your voice.

“I won’t have you question my methods,” he retorts.

“They’re obviously skilled at committing high treason,” you taunt, enjoying yourself. He craves deference, absolute obeisance; but you won’t be the one to give it to him. _Not today._ “Perhaps Supreme Leader Snoke should consider using a clone army.”

“My men are _exceptionally_ trained — programmed from birth —” Hux hisses, angry as a cat. He rounds furiously on you and you are glad of your mask, for if he could see the smirk on your face he’d surely slap it off.

“Then they should have no problem retrieving the droid,” you cut him off smoothly. “Unharmed.”

“Careful, Ren,” he warns you, his voice low, now, and deadly cool, “that your _personal interests_ not interfere with orders from Leader Snoke.”

 _And_ now _he decides to respect his authority,_ you think smugly. Your first thought is that Hux, of all people, has _personal interests_ that could very quickly turn things sour for him: why, _you_  — the bruises on your neck, your hips — are living proof of this. You smile to yourself behind the mask, but his words have struck a nerve all the same. Personal interests: _how much does he know?_

 “I want that map,” you snap out. “For your sake, I suggest you get it.”

You stalk off, leaving him fuming in your wake.

*

Hux is a soldier: the aim of his every action is conquest. You are no exception.

There have been nights, though, when he’s feeling sentimental — has imbibed, perhaps, a little too much at an officers’ banquet — when he’s spoken to you of his life, his plans. It transpires that his father was a military man as well, which doesn’t surprise you: “He was a commandant,” Hux tells you without emotion, in his chambers on one of those nights. “He died when I was very young — he was killed by the rebels at the Battle of Yavin. He never liked me much.”

“And yet here you are, carrying out his dreams,” you point out. You flout your vows and drink too (you suspect this won’t be the only rule you break tonight); you gesture to the general’s stripes on his uniform. “He’d be proud.”

“Not his dreams,” Hux corrects you automatically. “My destiny.”

“Ruling the galaxy?” you ask drily. He gives you a look. Even intoxicated he has no patience for teasing.

“Yes,” he says seriously. “That’s all I’ve ever wanted.”

Were he any other man — were _you_ any other man, for that matter — this childish certainty, belief in _destiny_ would be…laughable. Absurd. But for whatever reason (the wine, the hour, the fragile pride in his eyes; the fact that you were hand-picked by a mysterious order to carry out a _destiny_ of your own), you’re inclined to believe him.

“I know,” you murmur absently.

For the first time you wish, absurdly, that he could want — something else. You kiss him then, to stop yourself thinking, and you know he never will.

*

Hux announces to you and Snoke that Starkiller’s weapon is ready, that the time has come to put it to use; and Snoke grants him permission. He leaves the assembly room with a look of quiet triumph on his face.

Snoke tells you of an awakening. He speaks a name that you haven’t heard in years —  _Han Solo —_ and he calls him _your father;_ and you feel a shocking familiar sadness resonate through you, as if your very bones know it and ache with it.

“He means nothing to me,” you assure him quickly, though your heart is pounding, your mind racing now.

“Even you, the master of the Knights of Ren, have never faced such a test,” Snoke observes, his voice echoing in the dark dank chamber.

“By the grace of your training I will not be seduced.” You say it, and your voice sounds steady, and for a moment you believe yourself; but then fear creeps over you, and you feel cold. _And if I am not strong enough after all?_

“We shall see, Kylo Ren. We shall see.”

*

Hux stands in front of the assembled troops on the surface of Starkiller Base, his voice amplified and deadly. He shouts words of pride and rage, vengeance and determination; you listen from the shadows, and you, like all the rest, believe him; or at least you will yourself to.

He gives the command for the weapon to be fired. It charges up: you feel it in the ground beneath you, the entire planet pouring its energy into this beacon of destruction. A burst of light, of power — cheers rise up from the crowd, and a cruel smile twists across Hux’s face —

The explosion is audible even from here, planets away.

At the same second you gasp. Your eyes snap shut, you stumble back — you feel suddenly as if someone has reached inside your chest and clasped a cold fist around your heart — you are in _pain,_ you have never felt hurt like this —

You collapse.

*

You are awoken by shouting. “Help me! FN-1338, take his other arm,” someone snarls — you recognise Hux’s voice, and now you are being pulled to your feet. You groan. Hux has your left arm, a stormtrooper your right: you are being half-marched, half-dragged through the base and you are weak, so weak. _What happened?_

They take you to your quarters. Through bleary, half-open eyes you see the door slide open, recognise your sleeping chamber. You are deposited roughly on the bed. Hux’s voice again: “Leave us.” The door opens and closes and you are alone with him.

You open your eyes warily and the dim light hurts them. You open your mouth without making a sound and reach up a hand to shield your face. “Hux,” you force out. “What —?”

“You passed out,” he informs you brusquely, not looking at you — he’s fetching water, looking for a medkit — “Bathroom,” you’re about to tell him, just as he ducks in there and emerges carrying it. His face is hard.

“When the weapon fired you collapsed,” he continues, setting the glass of water next to your bed and pawing through the medkit. You drink gratefully; you hadn’t realised you were parched. You feel drained, depleted.

“Why?” you ask pointlessly.

Hux glares at you. “Why don’t you tell me?” he says icily. “Were you _overwhelmed?”_ he mocks.

“No,” you mutter, although now, as your thoughts begin to clear — Hux has rolled up your sleeve and injected you with something, an electrolyte solution, probably, and it un-fogs your mind considerably — you remember feeling a hurt that wasn’t yours, that had nothing to do with you… _Empathy._

You shudder. Feeling the emotions of others is one aspect of the Force that you’d rather go without. It can be very useful, but it’s unpleasant — too intense, too overwhelming…but usually you at least have control. In this case, you were unprepared, your guard down; and then —

“I felt them,” you whisper hoarsely. Hux pauses in his ministrations (he’s grudgingly bandaging the injection site, which has started to bleed; his ungloved hands are cold, like always) and looks up at you impatiently.

“What?” he snaps. You know he’s anxious to get back to his troops, to preside over the victory celebrations which are no doubt taking place.

“I felt them,” you repeat, your voice growing stronger. “The — the people in the Hosnian System,” you say, only realising the truth of this as you voice it. “I felt their pain.”

Your words hang in the air. Hux stares at you in disbelief.

“I felt their terror as they died,” you say now, wildly, the words spilling out. “I was _there_ with them, I was one of them — and it was too much —”

You break off, seeing disgust cross Hux’s face. “Impossible,” he says sharply, his voice low and cold. “Completely impossible.”

“You aren’t Force-sensitive,” you point out softly.

Rage twists his delicate features —  _he could be beautiful,_ you realise with a jolt, _if only he hadn’t so much hate in him._ The thought shocks you.

“Maybe not,” Hux hisses, “but I know enough of your _religion_ to know that that is not _possible.”_ He levels you with an irascible gaze. “Not on the dark side, at least.”

You look blankly back at him, both of you letting his words sink in.

“There is no light in me,” you whisper finally, your heart beating erratically like that of a dying bird. “Not anymore. There…can’t be.”

“Can’t there?” Hux asks impassively.

He leaves you with your head reeling.

*

His question plagues you. You lose sleep, you are distracted and impatient; you lash out at the troopers, at the staff on the base, even the droids who serve you your meals. You destroy computer systems, entire rooms, with your lightsaber — you nearly kill some petty officers — and you care nothing for the looks of cold fury Hux shoots you when he finds out. You throw yourself into your training with Snoke but you are so preoccupied that you can’t do anything right.

You spend hours alone in your chamber, spend all night on your knees: you pray. You beg for forgiveness, for guidance: “Show me again the power of the darkness,” you whisper to the husk of your grandfather’s helmet, “and I’ll let nothing stand in our way. Show me, Grandfather, and I’ll finish what you started.”

You bow your head, you are shaking. _I don’t know what to do._

*

When you capture the girl — Rey, the scavenger — on Takodana and bring her back to the base, you demand permission to torture her yourself. “I’ll find everything out,” you promise Hux, savagely desperate to prove ( _to whom?)_ that your powers are as strong as ever, that no trace of light remains in you.

He surveys you coldly: you suspect he is reluctant after your failure with the pilot. He must see the fervour, the madness in your eyes; the anxious tremor that runs through your body as if you’re electrically charged. Your mask is held under your arm: you drag a hand through your hair, pulling hard, as you wait for his answer. The pain grounds you, keeps you standing.

“Fine,” he says finally. “Don’t fail.”

And you don’t, at first. At first it is straightforward, practically routine: she struggles against her restraints as you enter easily into her mind. You taunt her with her own memories:

“You’ve been so lonely,” you murmur, your voice deadly gentle. “So afraid to leave.”

(Somewhere in the back of your mind this resonates. You know this feeling: you know it well. You fight to ignore it, to erase it, to forget you have ever felt it at all).

“At night, desperate to sleep, you’d imagine an ocean,” you croon cruelly, sifting deeper through her thoughts. “I see it. I see the island.”

She cries out, tears streaming down her face as she tries and tries to resist you, to prevent you from accessing the information you need — but you are stronger than she is.

“Don’t be afraid,” you tell her, struck momentarily with pity. “I feel it too.”

And then it is like you go blind. You cry out in shock and you see a look of surprised triumph flash across her pretty face. She has blocked you, somehow, with the Force, and you can see no more. You can’t believe this — she is a weakling, a mere child, untrained and helpless; _this should not be possible, this_ is _not possible…_ You push back, harder, you fight —

She resists you. And now — now she is inside your head.

She is tearing through your memories, unearthing thoughts and feelings that you have pushed down for years, that you have made dead to you. _A woman’s face, her laughter — a man picking you up, tossing you high in the air — the first time a lightsaber came alive in your hand — the sound of your name, your true name: “Ben”…_

Your fears. She sees you on your knees, tears tracking silently down your cheeks as you pray and pray and beg for help and guidance. She sees you weak and vulnerable and shaking, being torn apart from the inside out, _because what if he’s right, what if the light still remains?_

You cry out like a wounded beast. Rey stares at you, victorious, and her voice is quiet and defiant when she speaks.

“You’re afraid,” she whispers, “that you’ll never be as strong as Darth Vader.”

You feel the words like a physical blow. You stumble backwards out of the interrogation chamber, breathing hard, thrown and shaken _: this child, this scavenger…how dare she…how_ could _she…_

*

You call Hux to you that night. He enters your chambers looking guarded and unsure: normally it is he who summons you, when he…needs to.

“What is it?” he asks, cautious, suspicious. You have timed your summons perfectly; he’s just finished his nighttime patrol shift, as you’d planned. He’s still in his uniform, and you know he must have been heading to his quarters when you commed him.

“Ren?” he repeats, impatient, staring at you. “Why did you send for me?” he snaps.

“Did you mean what you said the other day?” you blurt out at once.

Hux looks lost: “What are you talking about?” he demands. “If you’re wasting my time —”

“About empathy,” you interrupt. “About the dark side. About — what I felt, when the Hosnian System was destroyed.”

His gaze bores into you. “Why?”

_Because I can feel the light in me._

You shudder. You say nothing; you feel yourself trembling.

Hux asks again: _“Why?”_

“My training isn’t complete,” you mumble. “What if some — some…light is still inside me?”

As you’d predicted, Hux scoffs. He dismisses it immediately: “How can there be? You’ve been trained by Snoke himself. You wouldn’t have made any progress if…if your fears were true.”

You know that, in his mind, it is as simple as this: black and white, no middle ground, just like everything else. You don’t think the way he does. “But _what if?”_ you press, growing anxious, feeling a fool. Hux levels you with a _don’t-be-ridiculous_ look and you flush.

“Is that the only reason you called me here?” he asks you acidly. “So you could vent your childish fears of not being _good enough?”_ he taunts.

You throw yourself on him before he can say any more. You pull him to the bed and kiss him fiercely, angrily. You bite his lip, nearly drawing blood, and he hisses your name; and then mercifully, violently, he kisses you back. You lose yourself right away: you need a distraction, you must not think about the girl and how she bested you, what that might mean for you: _I cannot be growing weak; the light side cannot master me…_

Suddenly you feel a surge of triumph: a glory that is not your own. You gasp and pull back from Hux: he is breathing hard, he looks up at you in irritation. “ _What?”_ he snarls.

“Did you feel that?” you ask, bewildered.

Hux looks blankly at you. “Feel _what?”_ he asks, his voice tight.

“That — glee,” you whisper. “Success. Exhilaration.”

You can tell by the barely-concealed distaste in his face that he doesn’t understand or care. “No.”

You stand abruptly and begin to pace, your heart rate slowing, your hair falling in your eyes. He watches you, incredulous, without a shade of comprehension.

“Someone else,” you whisper to yourself, thinking aloud. “Someone else is feeling this, and — and I’m sensing it too. Someone has…achieved a great victory.”

You reach out with the Force. At first there is nothing — the white-noise hum of the distant stormtroopers’ thoughts; closer now, a harsh glow of desire mixed with vexation from Hux —  _familiar, that one —_ and then all at once it comes to you: restraints being lifted, a stolen weapon, stalking silent as a cat through the halls of the base.

_Rey._

“The girl,” you blurt out. Your head is pounding with exertion and confusion: _How?_

“She’s escaped.”

*

By some miracle the Resistance makes the mistake of sending a reconnaissance ship, and Hux pounces; he has it tracked back to D’Qar and he lords his victory over you, just as you knew he would. He smiles savagely at you, his eyes seem to say _This round is mine;_ and still you cannot bring yourself to hate him.

But even worse than Hux’s haughtiness is your dread of reporting your failure to Snoke. You leave your mask off, you are humble and ashamed: “She is strong with the Force,” you protest as he looms, frowning, over you. “Untrained, but stronger than she knows.”

Snoke gives a rumble of discontent. “Where is the droid?” he thunders.

You groan inwardly: you have no answer for him, you stand dumbly saying nothing, and you are just thinking how grateful you are that Hux is not here to witness your disgrace when —

You hear the assembly room doors hiss open, and the efficient hurried click of boots on the floor. You dart a glance over your shoulder and then close your eyes in misery.

 _“Ren_ believed it was no longer of use to us — that the girl was all we needed,” Hux cuts in obsequiously, coming to stand beside you with his hands tucked neatly behind him. “As a result, the droid has now most likely been returned to the hands of the enemy.” He shoots you a look of controlled fury, and you stare back in defiance.

“Prepare the weapon,” Snoke orders Hux almost carelessly. Hux dips his head and hurries out.

Snoke turns back to you, his massive holographic form leaning down from his crumbling throne. You shrink back instinctively.

_“Bring the girl to me.”_

*

After that it should be easy. It seems, at first, that it will be. 

Hux sets the plan in motion at once. A course is set; the weapon is primed to fire a second time. The First Order will destroy the Resistance base there. The Republic’s fleet is already gone; they are decimated, they will be unable to defend themselves. The insubordinates will be annihilated and the Order will have its glory at last; or at least, these are Hux’s hopes. You yourself are unsettled, unsure, and this in itself makes you anxious. _Have I lost my faith?_

Hux stares out of the command centre viewports, watching the buzz of activity below: troopers and droids hurrying about, completing last-minute systems checks, ensuring everything is prepared and the way is paved to triumph.

“The galaxy will be ours,” he says softly, and a rare smile illuminates his face. From the way he says it you know he means _mine;_ and he is not wrong.

“What is left to conquer now?” you ask him, half-joking and desperately afraid. “What have you left to accomplish?”

He turns to you, unsmiling now. “This is all there is. All there ever was.”

*

He is gentle with you that night, unusually so: he has more important things on his mind; his energy is elsewhere. You test him: you cry out his name, and when he claps a hand over your mouth you understand fully what you think you have always known: that you are a distraction, an outlet, a thing to be used. Once he has his glory, his empire, he will have no more use for you.

You feel empty for reasons you can’t understand.

After, when he offers “Stay, if you’d like” — for the first time, for the last time? — you shake your head and turn your back on him.

*

And then it goes wrong.

The rebels infiltrate the base: Hux’s base, his invincible stronghold, the only thing he loves. In the crucible of the ensuing battle, his soldiers prove themselves cowards: they flee the base in droves, stealing TIE fighters, smaller ships, anything that can fly and that might save their worthless lives.

You see him in the thick of it, red in the face, shouting and nearly in tears, commanding them hopelessly to fight. You think to go to him —  _we can find a ship, we can get out alive —_ but then you are overwhelmed by _something_ that stops you in your tracks.

_Go to him._

Not Hux. Somehow, you know you must find your father. _He’s here._

The Force calls you to him — to Han Solo. You are drawn by an impulse so powerful that it seems to control your every movement, making your feet carry you through the fighting, unscathed, to find him.

“Follow me,” you shout to a straggling squadron of stormtroopers who are trying to be unseen. For just a moment, you overpower the force that has a hold of you, and you take action to protect yourself from whatever it is that will come. “Follow me and cover me!” you cry. You remember the girl, the traitor: “And find them!”

They fall in line, marching fast as you continue your journey to what you know, now, is your fate.

He finds you on a catwalk, in an oasis of calm amidst the chaos of battle — Han Solo, the man you once called your father. The troopers position themselves around, above, below. You are armed, you are protected: you have never felt more vulnerable.

“Ben!” he shouts, and it sends daggers through your head.

You step out to meet him.

He tells you to take off the mask. His voice is familiar, a long-unheard song whose words you still know by heart. The sound of it soothes the anguish in your mind; it calms the restless battle in your breast, and you see that it is so easy, what you must do here: _Give in to this, Ben, give in to the light and go home._

“What do you think you’ll see if I do?” you answer, resisting.

“The face of my son.”

His eyes plead with you: _I’ll forgive you. We will forgive you._

You take off your mask and you drop it at your side. The sound resonates through the chamber.

“Your son is gone,” you tell him, your voice shaking. “He was weak and foolish like his father, so I destroyed him.”

But even as you say it you know it is not true: for you can feel something surging inside you, something howling to be let out. You recall the crushing wave of _feeling_ that caused you to collapse when Hosnian Prime was destroyed. You think with shame of looking over your shoulder, night after night, after leaving Hux’s quarters. And you fight to ignore the compassion, the forgiveness, the _love_ that courses to you from Han Solo’s mind. You feel the light inside of you aching to respond.

“Snoke is using you for your powers,” Han Solo says to you. “When he gets what he wants, he’ll crush you. You know it’s true,” he pleads.

At this, you think not of Snoke but of Hux, and you flinch. You swallow hard.

“It’s too late,” you say, both to yourself and to him — your father.

“No, it’s not. Leave here with me. Come home. We miss you,” he tells you gently.

The howling in your head grows to fever-pitch. It engulfs your mind, dulls all your senses — and all you have to do to end this pain, to feel all right again, is give in to the light —  _to your true nature, Ben…_

_No. There is another way._

You think of Hux, smiling as a planet burned. The noise in your head begins to subside.

“I’m being torn apart,” you utter.

You breathe freely, now. Now you know what you must do, and everything is clear again. “I want to be free of this pain.”

You step closer to Han Solo. “I know what I have to do, but I don’t know if I have the strength to do it.”

You are lying: you have the strength of a thousand suns. You have never known such power. _Why, then, are there tears in your eyes?_

You look steadily at your father and you beseech him: “Will you help me?”

You have always known the light side to be weak. Your father confirms it now: “Yes. Anything.”

You take out your lightsaber, hold it out to him. Your hands touch his on the hilt of the saber. You see the hope in his eyes, the relief.

_Trusting fool._

The lightsaber ignites at the slightest touch, feeding off your energy. Staring into Han Solo’s eyes —  _your father’s eyes,_ your _eyes, Ben —_ you plunge the blade into his chest. Your father’s eyes widen.

“Thank you,” you whisper, as your vision blurs.

He reaches up to touch your cheek, his eyes wide and sad and calm, so calm. And then his fingers go limp, and he falls. You pull your saber back.

You expect to feel triumph. You want to feel joy. All you feel is heartbreak.

As Han Solo’s body plummets, you are startled to hear a Wookiee’s roar and a young woman’s scream. A bowcaster fires from somewhere unseen, above, and the shot sinks into your side. You cry out, but you are numb to the physical pain for a moment, overwhelmed by something stronger: you can sense your mother’s horror as she feels her husband dying.

His pain, her pain: _this should bring me comfort,_ you think, dazed. You moan as your own anguish sets in, and as the blood seeps through your robes you think _There is nothing left. I have done what I needed. He is gone; the light is gone._

Why, then, do you feel you have failed?

*

Chaos erupts around you. You look up, and see the girl and the traitor, being fired at by your troopers: it was the girl’s scream which gave them away. Your face contorts into a snarl: you follow them to the surface.

You dispose of the girl immediately. She screams as you throw her into the air with the Force; goes instantly silent as her body slams into a tree. Her companion, the ex-stormtrooper, roars her name as she falls, limp and still: _“REY!”_

The traitor turns on you in fury. You slam your fist into your wound; the pain keeps you strong _._

 _"Traitor!"_ you cry, thinking again of Jakku, of the village burning. Your lightsaber crackles in the cold snow-thick air. _He has no chance._

He ignites a battered saber, the blade blue and bright as ice. You recognise it with a shock. “That lightsaber — it belongs to me!” you shout.

He taunts you: “Come and get it.”

Your confusion (and your sorrow, though you dare not think the word) gives you strength; you will stop at nothing to erase the last of the light from yourself. _The girl must be dead by now,_ you think through a haze of pain. _Now I am free. I am ready._

You wound the traitor easily. But then he swipes at your arm, cuts you there; you grunt in anger and retaliate. He cries out in pain as you pin him to a tree trunk; hold your blade to his shoulder, searing the pilot’s jacket through to the dark skin beneath. He fights bravely, even you must admit it; but he is not trained. He is not you.

The stolen lightsaber flies out of his hand. It whirls through the air and lands in a snowdrift. The traitor stares at it in despair; he knows he has lost his last hope. You tear a slash down his spine and he falls.

You reach out for the fallen saber with the Force, with your mind: you coax it to you, _it is mine, it is mine…_

It comes tearing out of the snow and goes hurtling through the air past your face. You turn.

*

Rey, the worthless child from Jakku — Rey, who rent open your mind and ripped your memories free — has awoken, and now she takes the lightsaber that is rightfully yours. She stares at you, silent, and the weapon comes alive in her hand.

_How?_

You can do nothing else but fight her. You whirl and strike, you throw every ounce of your strength into the Force, into your weapon. The earth shakes and cracks beneath you: you back her up to the edge of a cliff, your blade crossed with hers, the air alive with hissing electricity and blue, red, purple sparks.

You know what you have to do. _The girl must die._ It would be so easy — you have her cornered here. She doesn’t know her own strength; she doesn’t know what she can and can’t do. You could kill her before she knew it was happening, before she even thought to defend herself. _Do it now!_

Something is stopping you.

“You need a teacher,” you call to her. The words are not yours. “I can show you the ways of the Force.”

For a long, long moment she hesitates. She closes her eyes.  “The Force,” she whispers, and she is reverent; she is afraid.

You wait, held prisoner.

And then her eyes fly open in rage. She strikes. She overpowers you. She wounds you. The earth opens up and she stands triumphant while you lie in agony, the snow reddening with your blood as you wait to die alone.

*

You dream.

You are in a haze of pain, you are in agony; and still you dream. You see a home you once knew but have long forgotten. You see the cold empty blackness of space, relieved by the sharp bright dots of so many dead stars. You see your grandfather’s helmet and you hear your father’s voice: _Ben. Ben. Come home._

You dream of Hux, and wonder if he will forgive you.

*

You wake, and he is there.

“We failed,” is the first thing Hux says when you open your eyes.

“I know.” Your voice is weak from lack of use. You are lying down in an uncomfortable bed: the walls around you are bright, blinding white. _A medbay._ The wound in your side still burns. “How did it end?”

“The rebels blew up the base. You nearly died,” he tells you, his voice flat. He won’t look you in the eye. “Snoke ordered me to find you and bring you to him. We’re going there now.” Something shifts in his tone. “You’ve been unconscious for nearly three days.”

“You saved me.”

He nods tightly. “I had to.”

You try to prop yourself up on your arm, and wince. “No, you didn’t,” you observe, your voice growing stronger. _When has he ever put himself in harm’s way for someone else’s sake?_

He looks at you now, angry, his eyes like chips of flint. “Snoke ordered me to. I told you.”

You see that his face is cut and scraped, and reach up to discover an angry laceration across your own cheek. You look down: his hands are startlingly pale without their gloves; held tight in his lap and crisscrossed with scratches, scabbing over. His fingertips are raw and red. “You’re hurt.”

“It wasn’t easy to get you out alive.” His voice is taut.

“Thank you.”

Hux looks away, gives a little sound of derision. “I was following orders, Kylo.”

“All the same.”

He doesn’t reply.

“I couldn’t kill her,” you murmur in the silence.

“Rey?” Hux pronounces her name with distaste.

“Yes.” You shift, grimace in pain. Hux’s fingers flex in his lap. “She was too strong. She overpowered me.” You look him in the eyes, not caring when he flinches. “The light is still in me, Hux. I can’t fight it. It made me weak — it wouldn’t let me kill her.” Your words hang in the air. “I don’t know what to do.”

He stares at you for one long breath. “Be careful, Ren,” he says finally, softly, an echo of another time, and he sounds almost — sad.

The comlink in his pocket trills. He takes it out, looks at the screen, and then rises. “I have to go.” Hux looks down at you, his green eyes inscrutable. He catches sight of the anaesthetic drip at your bedside, and asks “More?”

Without waiting for an answer he presses the button. The thick soothing liquid enters your veins, and instantly your eyes feel heavy; the throbbing in your side begins to ease. “Thank you,” you murmur, as your eyelids slide shut. You welcome slumber, escape.

You’ll never be sure if you imagined the press of his lips on yours before the door clicked shut behind him.

*

**Author's Note:**

> Come say hi on my [main blog](http://abernathae.tumblr.com), or my Star Wars/Kylux [sideblog](http://huxes.tumblr.com) — please talk to me about this stupid, stupid ship. :)


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